Adding A Feature To Instagram

Collab & Collect: A Fun Way to Save on Instagram

Adding a feature to an existing social media app to bring something new

Year

Duration

Role

2024

10 weeks

Sole UX/UI Designer

Introduction to the Design

Design Problem

Instagram users expressed that they view collaboration and organization as crucial. Because of this, I needed to find a way to enhance Instagram’s collaboration board features in a fun way to gain engagement.

100% of Instagram users, as seen in user interviews, view collaboration and organization as necessary.

Goal

An all-in-one app that plans and improves pet health, providing the resources a pet needs, would reduce stress and enhance pet care routines.

  • Add personalization by adding pet profiles and personalized tasks for the pet’s health and everyday needs.

  • Create a way for pet owners to look for pet sitters.

HMW Questions

How might we create a space for users to gather, organize, and personalize their inspiration, making it easy to use and navigate without feeling overwhelmed? 

How can we add more features and tools to create a collaborative experience through gamification, increasing app usage, and encouraging user engagement? 

POV Statement

Users face the challenge of lacking customization and personalization within apps like Pinterest. Many users get overwhelmed by the large amount of inspiration and the limitations of tools for organizing or personalizing it. As a result, they use multiple apps with specific tools they prefer, instead of using Instagram exclusively. 

Users generally value collaboration with friends and family, especially when gathering inspiration and ideas. Without these tools, the process becomes less enjoyable, leading users to use different platforms that support collaboration.

Insights Gathered

Competitive Analysis

Starting with my competitive Analysis, I reviewed three competitors for my research topic of creating mood boards: Pinterest, Canva, and Tumblr. During this process, I could already see strengths I could think about using in the future of this project.

Strengths

  • Visual Discovery and Inspiration Platform
    High Purchase Intent Among Users
    Robust Search and Recommendation System

  • User-Friendly (easy to navigate)
    Wide range of features
    Collaboration/Communication Tools

  • Creative Freedom
    Strong sense of community
    Niche Content

Weaknesses

  • Limited social interaction
    High Dependence on Advertising Revenue
    Challenges with User Retention and Growth in Certain Markets

  • Customization options limited
    Advanced features cause a learning curve
    Performance Issues

  • Fewer opportunities for creators to monetize their content
    Content Moderation Issues
    Declining User Base

User Interviews

Learning these insights from the participants in my user interviews helped shape my development of added features. It encouraged me to keep an open mind and be flexible with design changes, so that I could keep my users' needs in mind.

Total: 5 Participants

  • Four are Designlab students with different experiences.

  • One was not in the web design world, but they use Instagram a lot.

Common Themes

  • All participants use or have used Pinterest.

  • Customization, organization, and collaboration are key priorities.

  • Most didn't know Instagram has collaboration features.

Pain Points

  • Frustration with Pinterest’s limited customization/personalization.

  • Trouble saving or keeping track of inspiration.

  • Poor visibility of collaboration tools on other platforms.

User Interview Key Questions

  • What apps do they use to organize their inspiration?

  • What do they use Instagram for?

  • Challenges Faced

Affinity Mapping

Now that I have insights from my user interview, I grouped the insights into an affinity map by topic and found out what my users would like to see in my newly added feature.

Piecing the Puzzle Together

User Persona

The creation of these two user personas helped me to put a character behind what my users gave me insight into. I created two user personas with different backgrounds, but both want to use the collaboration and mood board feature in various ways.

Project Goals

My project goals include detailed needs for each category. My users, business goals, technical considerations, and what they have in common as a goal. These goals will be important in building an efficient feature.

User Flow

The User Flow made thoughts bloom into the starting of a process. I thought about how I could put my added feature in a visible area. This is because participants mentioned during interviews that they didn’t know there was a way to collaborate on the saved mood board.

Bringing Ideas to Life

Low-Fidelity Wireframing

Using my user flows and keeping the same navigation process, I created my low-fidelity wireframe. I made sure to design a way to make my collaboration and moodboard feature visible. The reason for this is that participants mentioned in the conducted user interviews that they didn’t know Instagram even had a collaboration option for mood boards.

High-Fidelity Wireframe

Once my Mid-fidelity user testing was finished, I was able to incorporate the feedback from participants into my High-Fidelity Design. With that in mind, I focused on improving navigation and adjusting the collaboration meter. As you can see, I started adding more content and detail leading up to the final design.

Refining the Journey

User Testing

My last usability test before Iterations helped me identify and improve some areas of the user experience. My goals in this process were to receive a lot of feedback on areas for improvement, identify roadblocks, and ensure that navigation was easy.

Collab Board

  • Three participants had trouble finding the collaboration board, especially on the feed page.

  • One participant misunderstood the "+" button for adding images and suggested adding image recommendations under the board.

  • One participant found the second part unclear.

  • One participant said navigation would improve with practice.

  • Three participants found the rest of the process easy and intuitive.

Unlock Achievement

  • Three participants found unlocking achievements easy, but suggested clearer button designs and improved profile visibility.

  • Two participants found collecting achievements to be unintuitive or too manual.

  • One participant had issues with navigation, requiring multiple tries to go back.

  • One participant suggested underlining the "View Achievement" button to make it look clickable.

Collab Timeline

  • Four participants found the task easy and smooth to complete.

    One participant completed it efficiently but suggested renaming the filter to something clearer, like "Change View" or "Change Timeline View."

Iterations

-I updated the "View Achievement" button by underlining the text to make it more straightforward as a clickable element based on participant feedback.

-Based on the feedback, I updated my prototype to make navigation more intuitive, allowing users to easily leave the achievement page or skip badge sharing.

-Based on the feedback, I renamed the "Filter" menu to "Filter by" for clarity and added a pressing state to the "Today" view to show its active state.

Final Design Mockups

Key Takeaways

Challenges Faced

  • The biggest challenge I faced was during my user interviews. I had received feedback from participants that I should change the design because some users didn't see its value. This made me feel lost and unsure of the next steps. However, when talking to my mentor and during my group critique sessions, I found that not everything needs to be a new product creation. It can be inspired by something else, which helped me continue with my design, but I'm looking for a new solution to a problem. 

Lessons That Shaped Me

  • I learned a lot about adding features to a product and how to enhance its benefits. This project has helped me remember that changing direction is part of the UX process. I also learned to keep my product in mind as I add a feature to Instagram, in terms of layout and structure, to ensure consistency with my added feature. With that in mind, it helped me adapt to changes and understand my users, which will help me sharpen my skills as I use them in the field.

Evolving as a Designer

This experience helped me sharpen my skills by ensuring I followed the design process while keeping my users’ needs my top priority. The challenge I faced allowed me to tackle design changes and unexpected gaps, and keep pushing forward to complete the end goal. Gaining all of this experience will help me become strong when I work in the field.